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Thread: Middleweights - Back In Business!

  1. #1
    Good evening roboteers!

    I'm very pleased to announce that middleweights will return to the UK at Extreme Robots Chatham! Pending FRA approval, we will designate this the FRA 2018 Middleweight Championships. Due to it being a quieter event than some others, we'll have space for a fully-fledged tournament. Depending on the amount of entries and slots we get, we can adapt the structure to meet everyone's needs, don't you worry
    Plus, I'm very pleased to announce a prize of £500, very kindly funded by ACE Robotics! More than enough to make another, so get building! It's a great chance at really giving them the start they need; some great exposure like that will help consolidate them as a legitimate weight class in the UK, and thus help give them a bright future.


    In the past, people have wanted to build the cheap and cheerful featherweights, or TV-ready heavyweights. But with no show now, we're entering a new generation of live robot combat, and these finally have a place (plus I'd argue they're a better fit in the arenas than heavies).
    With Robot Wars fresh in people's minds and interest at an all-time high, it's worth another go right?

    That's what I though three months ago when I considered building one. Turns out a few other teams were putting some together as well; things developed from there. Now, we've got four built and six on the way, plus great interest from others, far better than ever before. And they make so much sense; I'd long wanted to build a heavyweight, however they were simply too impractical for me om my own, not to mention a tad out of my budget. But a pair of TZ85s, 350w scooter motors, heck even wheelchair motors: these give a more than decent drive for a MW at a fraction of the cost. I'm able to build and transport this all on my own with relative ease, which would be a hell of a task with a heavyweight.

    But what to do with these new robots?
    Well, we have confirmation from Jonno that middleweights are absolutely fine in his arena, and Alan says we can fight any non-Full-Pressure HW flipper because of the roof. The choices are great at the moment; Robogames is the obvious one, however I know FMB are really keen to accept more middleweights this year. Even a Chinese TV show as a clusterbot. But we have some great options at home: we can run on our own, in clusters, or of course the champs.

    What do you say?
    If you've ever thought of building a heavyweight but don't quite have everything necessary, why not give these a go? They're less of a major investment, plus we'd welcome a new middleweight with open arms; and you'll be part of something truly great.

    Good luck!


    Theo - Second Chance Robotics.
    Last edited by Theo; 16th June 2018 at 10:36.

  2. #2
    Pretty Cool!
    I´m a big fan of Middleweight. Maybe I should calculate for an Middleweight, cause I will visit Chatham with my Heavy

  3. #3
    YES! I always wanted to build something bigger than a feather, but didn't have the budget or the space to stretch to a heavy. Manchester and Gloucester are all I can get to, so fingers crossed they open up other Extreme Robots events to MWs next year!

  4. #4
    See, you are exactly our main audience, go for it dude! We're not just limited to Chatham, we can still run at the events on our own or in clusters. But Chatham is where the main tournament will be.
    Good luck!

  5. #5
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    God dammit. I just bought all the parts I needed for a BW, if only you'd been a few weeks earlier with this, i'd have shot for MW parts and gone whole hog!

    Team Death might be able to put together a little surprise though, if we hve enough time after the HW!

  6. #6

  7. #7
    Ocracoke's Avatar
    Team Kaizen

    Kaizen will be there... if I can get past all the problems I am having with it at the moment :P
    Team Kaizen - Build Diary for all the robots

    AW: Amai, Ikari, Lafiel, Osu, Ramu
    BW: Shu!, The Honey Badger
    FW: Azriel
    MW: Jibril, Kaizen

  8. #8
    Just a note on spinners:

    Jonno's said Chatham is important to show off what the class is capable of, and how entertaining they can be (especially if we go with a head-to-head structure). So making the robots and fights as good as possible only makes sense. However there will obviously be a small number of middleweights at the event and indeed for a good while. This means it's necessary to avoid causing terminal damage to any of the entrants, as that won't do anyone any good.

    So if you're building (or thinking of building) a spinner, please don't make it completely overpowered for everyone's sake; this has been agreed by a number of MW roboteers. If you're designing with foreign competitions in mind (RoboGames, FMB, etc), then by all means make as destructive as you'd like, but you may want to tone it down for the UK live events.

  9. #9

  10. #10

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